Tag Archives: hey there

You’re never too old to learn – Seth Rudetsky’s master class at Farmington Players, November 2

2 November 2014

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Seth RudetskyYou’re never too old to learn, I suppose. At least that was the lesson I gained today during Seth Rudetsky‘s wonderful master class taught at Farmington Players in Farmington Hills, Michigan. Thanks to the group and specifically to Amy Lauter for organizing the event, which saw local performers go through the exercise of auditioning before Mr. Rudetsky as well as an appreciative audience of approximately 130 people.

Sitting there, starting at noon, all of us guinea pigs lined up in the front row, nervously awaiting Seth’s appearance, not sure what to expect. Would he be more Simon Cowell, all glistening fangs and catty remarks, or Mr. Rogers, full of affirmation and delightful support?

Blessedly, he was more the latter, but not without insightful critique which inspired immediate improvement from all of us performers.

Seth opened the session with a brief overview, along the lines of this YouTube video – practical (and funny!) advice about how to prepare music, how to get ready for an audition, and how to put yourself in the proper head-space to succeed …

Following that intro, Seth began drawing our names from a hat … well, a decorative bowl … and one by one, we marched up on the stage, allowing Seth to a rifle through our prized binders of sheet music and to select a cut or two for us to perform. The age of the performers ranged from 11 to “we’d-rather-not-say,” with an array of songs from Broadway canon, pop, and beyond – Sondheim, Rodgers & Hammerstein,  and … er … General Hospital. You had to be there.

(I sat there nervously for hours wondering if my name was even in the bowl at all, but, finally, next to last, my name was called. I futilely tried to step directly on the stage from the front row – who needs stairs? At which time, I did this awkward army crawl/roll center stage. Yup, I know how to make an entrance. Sigh.)

Seth took his time with all of us, stopping at key points in our songs and offering us direction on how to improve our delivery: “be in the moment,” “what are you thinking about there,” “why hold that note and what are you conveying emotionally if you do so,” “plant yourself,” “take a position of strength,” “there are no songs that shouldn’t be used in auditions, but you have to find the song that features you and your talent best.” Pretty great life advice, let alone fabulous guidance for an exceptional audition.

I sang Pajama Game‘s “Hey There,” after fumbling disastrously with my own notebook, like a nervous junior high school kid. I blushed when Seth said he really likes my old-school songs (all raided from my mom’s exceptional sheet music collection). And I was a dutiful student, taking his advice on a song that I had sung so often it had become akin to “Jingle Bells” or “Happy Birthday” in my head … musical wallpaper.  I was struck by how different the final performance was that resulted – thanks, Seth!!

Thanks to “Legally Blonde the Musical” pal Amy Poirier for grabbing that quick clip from this afternoon, and enjoy the following video, taken by my cousin Alexandra Poor, of my performance of the song in Spotlight Players’ 2009 production of “The Pajama Game” …

Seth said I may be a little too old to sing “Real Live Girl” or “Corner of the Sky” any more … phooey, and I would have been very curious for his reaction to my take on Tom Lehrer’s “Masochism Tango” from Tomfoolery. Maybe next time!

Thank you, Seth! I may never make it to Broadway, but I feel like Rudetsky brought a little bit of Broadway to the future of my local performing.

But me being weird ol’ me, the highlight of the afternoon for me was this … Seth encouraged all of us to sing as if we were serenading a beloved rescue pet – sing every song thinking of an animal we love, bringing out all the authentic, vibrant colors of that pure emotion. He also let us know that Roberta Flack dedicated “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” to her cat!  I like that song so much better now! Seth is an active Facebooker and sprinkles his promotional efforts with many, many posts to help our animal friends. Be sure to check out and follow his Facebook page, and if he comes to a town near you, go to his live show, sign up for his class, and thank him for all his generous and gracious work.

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Tomfoolery

Tomfoolery

Reel Roy Reviews is now a book! Thanks to BroadwayWorld for this coverage – click here to view.

In addition to online ordering at Amazon or from the publisher Open Books, the book currently is being carried by Bookbound, Common Language Bookstore, and Crazy Wisdom Bookstore and Tea Room in Ann Arbor, Michigan and by Green Brain Comics in Dearborn, Michigan.

My mom Susie Duncan Sexton’s Secrets of an Old Typewriter series is also available on Amazon and at Bookbound and Common Language.

Stop taking photos of sandwiches: Betty Buckley’s “Ah, Men!”

24 November 2013

9 Comments

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Legendary Betty Buckley with not-so-legendary Roy Sexton [Photo by Author]

Facebook is a funny thing. Such a powerful tool that could do so much to create positive social change is being used for rather mundane, likely superficial, arguably dumb things: bragging about new homes, taking photos of sandwiches, complaining about Lady Gaga.

I love (not) the people who opine about “declining morals of society” and then post photos of themselves doing body shots at a Jimmy Buffett concert. Accountability? Yeah, apparently only when it’s a one-way street headed to Sarah Palin-ville.

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Lobby of The Columbia Club
[Photo by Author]

And then there are the friends (and sometime relatives) who bloviate about how some people have “too many friends” and “how could you know all of those people” and “aren’t you afraid of identity theft…cause you want to waaaaaaatch.” I don’t know what motivates this last string of comments: jealousy, annoyance, small-picture thinking, or the fact that the more friends one has the harder it is to stalk all their comings and goings on the social network.

So why am I on this annoyingly self-serving high horse? Perhaps I’m full of myself because I had the privilege of meeting a Tony Award-winning performer I’ve long-admired. I was listening to her CDs in college when my fraternity brothers were blasting Bob Marley and Pearl Jam on the front lawn.

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Buckley with Susie Duncan Sexton [Photo by Author]

What does this have to do with Facebook? Well, said performer has very smartly leveraged the communication platform to connect with generations of fans in an authentic and direct way, without the meddling intermediary of a PR agent. I was beyond geeked a few years back when we “friended” one another in cyberspace and struck up conversations over the intervening months about politics, movies, and animals.

Who is this tech-savvy celebrity? You’ve probably deduced by the blurry photos above (my family just can’t be trusted with cameras, myself included) or, heck, from this blog entry’s title: Betty Buckley.

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Entrance to The Columbia Club
[Photo by Author]

Betty Buckley is known to some musical theatre neophytes as “Abby” on Eight is Enough or as Sissy Spacek’s sympathetic (slap notwithstanding) gym teacher in Carrie. To some adventurous cinephiles, Buckley is remembered for her character turns in Tender Mercies, Frantic, or The Happening. And for millennials who subsist on a steady diet of the CW and ABCFamily, they would have seen Buckley pop up on brother Norman Buckley’s saucily fun Pretty Little Liars. (Norman and mom Betty Bob are fantastic Facebookers as well!)

But for us theatre nuts, Ms. Buckley will always be known for her knockout performances in such classic musicals as 1776, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Cats, and Sunset Boulevard among many others. And for her series of jazz-infused, confessional cabaret recordings over the past 20+ years.

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“Ah, Men!” album cover [Photo by Author]

One of her latest cabaret offerings – recording as well as live performance – is a show called “Ah, Men! The Boys of Broadway!” The nifty conceit of the show is Buckley’s fulfillment of a lifelong desire to perform all the great Broadway anthems written expressly for men.

Given our Facebook connection with Ms. Buckley, there was no way we would miss seeing her perform in Indianapolis’ most splendid room: The Cabaret at The Columbia Club, a surprisingly intimate yet Eloise-esque marble-floored, velvet-curtained, lost-moment-in-time hall with a ceiling-to-floor window overlooking the twinkling lights of Monument Circle.

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Stage at The Cabaret [Photo by Author]

You must catch this show if it comes anywhere near your community. It’s not often you get to hear a legend in person, let alone one as relatable as Buckley. Her between-song patter is a hoot: for example, as a kid, she desperately wanted to be a “Jet” in her local community’s production of West Side Story, and these anecdotes offer the perfect context for her song choices.

And, oh, what song choices! Many of my personal favorites – from The Fantasticks‘ rallying “I Can See It” to Guys and Dolls’ elegiac “More I Cannot Wish You” – are featured. The Sweeney Todd medley effortlessly marries “Not While I’m Around,” “Johanna,” and “My Friends,” capturing the melodiously tragic arc of Sondheim’s best show in a perfect seven-minute bon-bon.

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Roy Sexton, Susie Duncan Sexton, and The Cabaret’s executive director Shannon Forsell [Photo by Author]

Accompanist and arranger Christian Jacob helps Buckley transform the bombast of The Pajama Game‘s signature tune “Hey There” into a haunting, undulating meditation on regret, loneliness, and heartache. But the show’s highlight is a ten-minute Spike Jones-meets-Mel Brooks riff on My Fair Lady’s “Hymn to Him” in which Buckley runs through nearly every noteworthy male role in the musical theatre canon and winkingly expounds on how much better her take on said roles would be.

We have admired and appreciated Ms. Buckley’s talent throughout her career; we are grateful to live in an age where technology allows us to appreciate the person as well as the performer, an age that can inspire thought and expression and compassion and kindness … if people will let it … and stop taking photos of their d*mn sandwiches.

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P.S. Sorry for another outright plug, but please do check out my mom Susie Duncan Sexton’s new book Misunderstood Gargoyles and Overrated Angels – in paperback or digital download at  www.susieduncansexton.com, www.amazon.com, or www.open-bks.com (also available on iTunes). I love what pundit, columnist, and radio host Carol Baker just wrote about the book and thought I’d share it here…

As a weekly columnist, writing on topics of politics and social justice, I find Susie’s writing style a breath of fresh air. As I sailed through story after story, it was like sitting across a kitchen table, having an old friend share stories of their life over an endless cup of coffee. I know how to bring a reader into a story to laugh or to cry or to be an intimate observer, but Susie effortlessly helps to evoke memories of my own early childhood, my youth, young adulthood and ultimately, to come to terms with an aging body. Susie glides from topic to topic through time and weaves her stories like a familiar old song. I’ve committed to attempting a Susie Duncan Sexton homework assignment of becoming a storyteller because she’s proven it’s never too late to stretch my writing chops. She inspires me to write more – and to write better. She inspires me to write with less angst and to simply “think out loud on paper”. Perhaps to be a little more understanding of the gargoyles and a little less approving of the angels.

This is comfort food for a writer’s soul.